


Love Spells

by Lebateleur



Category: Onmyouji | The Yin-Yang Master (Movies)
Genre: First Time, Heian Period, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Humor, M/M, Magic, Morning After
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-23
Updated: 2011-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-27 21:27:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/300217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lebateleur/pseuds/Lebateleur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Hiromasa is constantly drunk, Seimei is constantly amused, random bushi make cameo appearances, and nothing goes according to plan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love Spells

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Shayheyred](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shayheyred/gifts).



> For Shayheyred, who gave me the best. Prompt. Ever. Merry yuletide! I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it.^^

“Hm?” With a start, Hiromasa pulled his attention back from where it had wandered to the sunlight slanting over the western wing of Seimei’s residence. Seimei’s bland smile gave away nothing beyond the fact that he was waiting for Hiromasa to say…something. At a loss, he tried nodding sagely. “Be that as it may, it’s getting late.” He shook out his sleeves with what he hoped looked like firm resolve. “I should be going.”

“Yes, it is. You should.”

“Yes, it is. You should,” echoed Mitsumushi from beside the apricot tree in the garden.

Seimei’s eyes crinkled in benign amusement and with a sinking feeling in his stomach Hiromasa realized that Seimei had most likely been urging him to go in the first place. He brought his cup of wine to his lips to hide his confusion, slopping some of it down his sleeve in the process. Try as he might, he always seemed to be two steps behind Seimei.

Seimei lifted his own cup to his lips with a languid hand, dropping his head but not his gaze to regard Hiromasa in that way he had that set the entire capital to whispering about foxes. The creases around his eyes deepened with silent laughter. “No, I should apologize to you,” he said, although Hiromasa didn’t remember expressing aloud his chagrin that he’d let his thoughts drift off into the clouds. “Minamoto no Hiromasa is very much in fashion of late. I fear I’ve kept you to myself for too long already.”

“Seimei!” Hiromasa joined in the laughter this time, his own easygoing nature making it difficult for him to hold a slight or feel discomfort at his own thick-headedness for very long. Seimei was teasing him, but he knew as well as anyone how much Hiromasa had come to enjoy his company.

“Well,” said Seimei, and rose liquidly to his feet while Hiromasa, who was already slightly the worse for drink and—truth be told—somewhat clumsy to begin with, scrambled up after him. They padded along the veranda to the back gate, where a smiling, silent beauty was waiting by the steps with Hiromasa’s shoes in her hands. She dropped to her knees in front of him, eyes demurely lowered.

“Ah…thank you,” said Hiromasa awkwardly, unused to the attention of female attendants. The woman helped him into his shoes and then collapsed into a perfectly coral apricot blossom and blew away on the evening breeze.

Cold fingers ran up and down Hiromasa’s spine, but the moment had passed by the time his brain caught up with his eyes. His surprise at his own lack of visible reaction turned to pleasure as he caught sight of Seimei’s appraising glance. Of course, his apparent equanimity had more to do with the sake he’d consumed than with any sudden ability to tolerate Seimei’s supernatural jests, but the approving hint of a smile at the corner of Seimei’s lips was no less a cause for pride because of it.

They paused outside the gate as Hiromasa’s attendants, who had been dozing in the shade of the wall, shook themselves awake and set about readying his carriage. He cast a sidelong look at his friend. “Hey, Seimei. Couldn’t you send an apricot blossom to the Palace in my stead?

“Oh?” Seimei turned to face him, his eyebrows describing two perfect arches of amusement.

“The full moon will shine brightly tonight. It would be a pitiable thing to view it alone. Send a _shikigami_ in my stead and I’ll enjoy it here with you,” he urged, pressing his case.

“Wouldn’t it be an even more pitiable thing for you to leave your new love to view it alone?”

Hiromasa knew he was grinning foolishly, but he found he didn’t care. “She will forgive me.”

Seimei’s mouth quirked. “You are certain of this?”

Hiromasa was. The imagery evoked in the poem she’d sent this morning had left him in no doubt of that. Only think of it—a woman sending a poem to her suitor on the morning after. It was unheard of! But it was also entirely in keeping with what little he knew of her, and what he did know, he found fascinating.

Hiromasa said as much to Seimei, who threw his head back and laughed, a genuine, full-throated explosion that only he would be unashamed to display in public. The eyes of Hiromasa’s attendants flashed in their direction at the sound of Seimei’s laughter, and they set about preparing Hiromasa’s carriage with a renewed sense of urgency.

“I’m surprised, Seimei,” said Hiromasa, who felt as though he would never tire of discussing his new good fortune in love. “You didn’t speak so lightly of Lady Karegiku.”

“Mm.” Seimei’s answer was noncommittal. Hiromasa followed his gaze over the rooftops of the northwestern wards to Hiei Mountain. “In reality, she loved you very shallowly.”

“Yes,” Hiromasa conceded. “Although I didn’t realize that was so at the time.”

“Hiromasa-sama.” One of the attendants approached them and bowed, carefully averting his eyes from their faces.

“In that case,” said Hiromasa.

“In that case,” said Seimei.

The butterfly hovering just inside the gate was mute, but Hiromasa’s mind supplied her voice anyway: “In that case...”

He clambered into the carriage and it was off, trundling toward the palace as fast as the rutted lane allowed. Hiromasa found to his surprise that he was suddenly much drunker than he’d been while at Seimei’s. His limbs seemed dull and heavy and each bump and jolt made his head throb. Seimei’s words threaded through his thoughts like eels. _In reality, she loved you very shallowly._

He saw now that that was the case, but at the time he’d thought she was the only woman in the world. He’d thought he’d willingly throw away his life for her. She had been as cold and mocking as she was beautiful, which made her rare moments of tenderness all the more poignant. Seimei had never spoken a word in criticism of her, but Hiromasa, who was forever lamenting his inability to comprehend the nuance in others’ emotions, had somehow known that Seimei had _hated_ her. This had saddened him, which in turn confused him, but he had been resolute in his love for the Lady even still.

When she had first started refusing to see him, when she began returning the clumsy love letters she had once claimed were endearing back to him unread, Hiromasa had been frantic with the need to win back her heart. When he heard of her sudden marriage to the Minister of Ceremonies, he had retired to his curtained bed chamber determined to die there in the dark.

In the end, Seimei had been the one to draw him out. In his grief and anger at the world, Hiromasa had thought to refuse Seimei’s invitations as the Lady Karegiku had refused his. He first returned Seimei’s letters, then ignored the messengers Seimei sent to summon him. Seimei had finally dispatched his own carriage to collect Hiromasa, which, when he had refused that well, remained outside the front gate for all and sundry to gape at as they passed by. It had apparently been all the Inner Palace could speak of for a fortnight.

Even though Hiromasa knew that no freezing rain would ever stain the silk hangings or dry winter air crack the fragrant wood of any carriage owned by Abe no Seimei, and even though he knew that the young attendants standing beside it were _shikigami_ and thus impervious to the elements, his determination to withdraw from the world was, in the end, no match for his natural sympathy for others, as Seimei had no doubt known would be the case.

Hiromasa had relented on the ninth day, unable to stomach the thought of either the carriage or its attendants standing bereft in the cold and damp any longer. He rose from his bed, dressed, carefully did up his topknot and boarded the carriage, which had borne him silently across Ichijomodori-bashi to Seimei’s estate. Seimei had received him with sake and refreshments impeccably selected to match the season and Hiromasa’s own sense of lovelorn melancholy.

Indeed, Seimei had been uncharacteristically kind and solicitous following the Lady Karegiku’s abandonment, for which Hiromasa was profusely grateful even as he found it unnerving. After all, Seimei could be quite stinging about the romantic follies of the Emperor’s court, and he had clearly disliked Lady Karegiku. Hiromasa found this new evidence of Seimei’s regard for him as unsettling as he had found Seimei’s tears as he lay dying in his arms, although he would never admit any of this to Seimei himself.

It was at this point that Hiromasa had first asked Seimei about love spells. Seimei had answered that such things were not possible. This struck Hiromasa as pushing the bounds of the credible, as he had by this point witnessed enough to convince him that Seimei was capable of anything. But he could tell Seimei did not wish him to pursue the subject further, so he had let the matter drop.

And yet, he had been unable to dispel the notion that he was cosmically unlucky in love, and that it would take more than his individual effort to overcome this unfortunate karma. Without saying anything, especially not to Seimei, he had stolen away under pretext of calling on an old acquaintance to a shrine in the eastern mountains, the deity of which was widely held by the ladies-in-waiting at court to be efficacious in securing romantic fortune for its petitioners. Feeling quite nervous that he would be recognized, and more than a little silly about the very endeavor itself, Hiromasa had followed what he knew of the proper procedure, which he’d reconstructed as best he could from the ladies' chatter.

The whole operation had taken mere moments to carry out, and Hiromasa returned to his estate feeling that, for all his fervent wishes that the protector of the shrine look favorably on his request, he had accomplished little more than walking a few spans across the shrine grounds. He certainly hadn’t sensed any of the raw, unsettling power he felt whenever he was in Seimei’s presence.

And yet, the magic must have taken hold, because an unfamiliar messenger had been waiting by his gate when he stumbled home that evening disappointed and exceedingly drunk. The messenger handed him a letter, bowed silently, and departed before Hiromasa managed to collect his wits and ask who had sent him.

His only thought had been to go inside and collapse into his bed and the oblivion of sleep, but somehow some small part of his mind was curious as to what sort of love letter—for the paper on which it was written clearly indicated that that was what it was—an unnamed woman would write to a man with whom she had never exchanged any word or act of affection.

Filled with skepticism, Hiromasa opened the letter and fell utterly in love with its author.

That she was both uncommonly beautiful and sensitive was immediately evident from her elegant brushstrokes and the refined imagery of her verse. Yet there was also something slightly unsettling about her choice of poetic allusion and the way it was paired to the perfume of the paper. It niggled at the corners of Hiromasa’s thoughts but darted away like a minnow into the shallows whenever he tried to look at it directly, and in the end he had no choice but to attribute his misgivings to his own drunken state and general lack of refinement. He only knew that he didn’t want their correspondence to end here.

He pulled his writing desk over to his sleeping platform and quickly composed a reply, even as he knew he was being completely irrational. Assuming that he could somehow find a way to convey his letter to her, his general poetic ineptitude would most likely discourage any further response. He grew increasingly frustrated with each hackneyed attempt at a reply—how on earth could he hope to impress her with such garbage—until breaking with all convention, he finally settled on a single, desperate response. _Please tell me where to find you._

He sealed the letter before he could think the better of it and carried it to his gate, knowing all the while it was futile but convinced that sleep would evade him until he saw with his own eyes that no one was there to receive it.

Nothing greeted him but empty streets when he opened the gate and peered out. When no better plan of action presented itself, Hiromasa carefully laid the letter in the dirt at the foot of the gate and stumbled back to his bed before the cold made him sober.

He was awoken some hours later by one of his household attendants, clearly as tired and groggy as was Hiromasa. Given their mutual unalert state, it took some moments before the man’s words made sense. A messenger was at the gate. Yes, he’d come bearing a letter. No, he’d insisted that Hiromasa-sama read it immediately. Yes, he was still there, awaiting a reply.

Hiromasa opened the letter with fumbling hands. Its tone was arch and amused, chiding him for his directness and inability to catch subtle allusions in verse. Well, he had known those things about himself already. He didn’t even care that she was pointing them out so directly, because she had responded.

Hiromasa decided he wouldn’t take any more chances. Instead of bothering with another useless attempt at a reply he threw on a warm outer robe and went out to ask the lady’s messenger directly who she was and where he might find her.

The messenger was standing beside the lady’s carriage. He looked up as Hiromasa appeared at the gate and gestured wordlessly for him to enter. Feeling as though he might not actually be awake at all, Hiromasa complied and let the carriage bear him to the Lady’s residence. Now drunk as much with relief and excitement as with liquor, he had quickly embraced her and spent the night there behind her silk screens. Convention dictated that he leave before the sun rose next morning, but he had slept so deeply in her arms that he barely woke in time to make his escape before the situation became unseemly. There had been no time for parting words, or even a hastily dashed off poem.

As his own carriage bore him away from Seimei’s estate to this evening’s banquet, Hiromasa wondered if the lady’s carriage would be waiting for him again tonight. He found himself hoping it would. He had been far too drunk to remember much more than fragments of the evening—a sly smile, sable hair spilling over shoulders and back, his hands gripped around a slender waist, the impression of a whispered, passionate conversation. He barely even remembered returning to his own estate, his head had been pounding so fiercely. Even the faint dawn light was so painful he could hardly keep his eyes open to see the road under his feet. It was unfortunate, because he would have liked to have stolen back tonight—his one overriding impression of the evening was that it had been exceedingly pleasurable.

The late winter moon would be especially beautiful tonight. Be it Seimei or the lady, Hiromasa wanted someone to enjoy it with. Both their carriages, his thoughts reeled on muzzily, were certainly more pleasant conveyances than his own, the wheels of which seemed to seek out every rut and pothole in the road as if by design. He bunched up one of the silk hangings and leaned against it, trying to pad his forehead from jostling against the interior walls as he rattled down the street. “Hey, Seimei,” he murmured, not certain whether he was talking to himself or if he really thought his friend might somehow be listening. “Why do you refuse to cast love spells?”

“Do you really believe a person’s heart is something that can be swayed so easily?”

“Does it matter?” Hiromasa asked, trying not to slur his words. Of course Seimei wouldn’t see things the same way. He had no doubt that a man as accomplished as Seimei could win any heart at all if he so desired, but who else was that fortunate? “Why not just tell me, Seimei? Anything you say now,” he urged, “I won’t remember.”

Seimei’s low chuckle filled the interior of the carriage. “That does seem to be the case, doesn’t it?” He continued. “Love itself is a spell, one which the magic of others is powerless against.”

Perhaps it was his drunken state, but this made a great deal of sense to Hiromasa. “But if that’s the case, then the situation is hopeless.”

Seimei chuckled again. Hiromasa rather thought he was finding the conversation more amusing than warranted. “Don’t despair, Hiromasa. In reality, there’s no need for magic at all in these matters. They have a way of resolving themselves.”

But how, thought Hiromasa with some irritation, would you know? Even shorn of his magical powers, Seimei could probably still enchant any woman he desired. It suddenly occurred to Hiromasa that he had never actually heard Seimei speak of any women—surely he must have at least one? He opened his mouth to say as much, but at that moment the carriage shuddered to a stop—they had arrived at the outer palace. Hiromasa knew that even if he asked now, Seimei would not answer. He stepped from the carriage and went to present himself at the banquet, trying not to sway too visibly as he did so.

Hiromasa dreaded all court functions as a general rule, but thankfully this evening’s formalities had concluded quickly, and the participants were now drinking and carousing with vigor. Finding himself unmoved by the musicians’ lackluster rendition of a popular court dance from the continent, Hiromasa rose and began making his way on unsteady legs to the edge of the crowd. With luck, he could slip out unnoticed and return to Seimei’s.

“Hiromasa-dono!” The voice hailed him just as he was rounding the hallway corner. He turned to find a member of the Right Guard with whom he sometimes practiced at the archery yards hurrying toward him.

“Oh, isn’t it Noriyuki-dono,” he said, and then bowing to the inevitable, “Let me pour you a glass.”

“Yes,” Noriyuki agreed, grabbing him by the sleeve and leading him back down the stairs to a knot of men standing on the shore of the ornamental lake. The parted to make room for him, one of their number shoving a fresh cup of wine into his hand.

“So tell us,” said Noriyuki, jabbing him good-naturedly in the ribs.

“Tell you?” he parroted stupidly.

“About your new mistress—oh, don’t act like you don’t know what we’re talking about,” he continued as Hiromasa tried to catch up. “Tadasuke saw you crawling back to your estate this morning when the watch was changing at the Rabbit Hour.”

Hiromasa gulped down another mouthful of wine, knowing it was a bad idea all the while. “She has beautiful black hair,” he began.

A nearby _bushi_ snorted. “Yeah, yeah, of course she has beautiful hair. They always do,” Noriyuki said. “Do we look like we care?” He leaned in conspiratorially and dropped his voice. “Forget about that bullshit and tell us about the interesting things!”

The conversation was moving much too quickly for Hiromasa’s spinning head. “Interesting things?”

“That’s right! What are her tits like? How does she wriggle around when you’re on top of her?”

Hiromasa coughed. “I don’t remember what…she…looks like.” He was vaguely aware that the men around him had fallen silent.

Noriyuki gaped. “You don’t remember?” he said incredulously.

“No,” said Hiromasa, and then spouted out the first thing that came to mind in his eagerness to please. “I was too drunk. But it was a very good night.” He was aware of how lame the words sounded even as they left his mouth.

“Ahh, Hiromasa-dono is too embarrassed to tell us anything,” one of the other _bushi_ groused. They lost interest soon thereafter, and Hiromasa thankfully extricated himself from their midst and left the palace for home.

But sleep eluded him tonight as well. He had been very drunk last night—it was only natural that he didn’t remember it well. But even still, Noriyuki’s words prickled. There was a reason why it was important for him to remember. Hiromasa groaned and scrubbed a hand over his eyes in frustration. A sly smile, sable hair on pale skin, whispered conversation, his hands around a slender waist. He turned it over again in his mind. A sly smile, sable hair on pale skin, whispered conversation, his hands gripping a slender waist. Sable hair on pale skin, a sly smile, whispered conversation, his hands around a waist. His hands around a waist, a vulpine smile, sable hair spilling over pale skin. He turned it over yet again. His hands around a slender waist, a vulpine smile, whispered conversation, sable hair spilling over Seimei’s pale skin.

Groaning again, Hiromasa rose and began dressing with grim determination.

Seimei opened the gate himself, for which Hiromasa was thankful. He didn’t think he could have maintained his resolve had Seimei sent a _shikigami_ to receive him into the interior of the house. He was still having second thoughts as it was.

“Did you cast a love spell on me?” he blurted out before he lost his nerve.

The sly smile. “I told you such things aren’t possible.”

Hiromasa gaped at him. “But I was writing back to a woman! I—”

Seimei’s expression of equanimity was almost masklike, save for the creases forming around his eyes. He lifted his chin ever so slightly in the direction of Hiromasa’s carriage and the attendants standing beside it.

Hiromasa gulped and followed Seimei into the house and down a breezeway to the study, where a warm brazier was standing by a table on which several scrolls had been laid out. Seimei seated himself gracefully behind it and shook out the sleeves of his robes. His amusement at Hiromasa’s agitation was all the more palpable for being nearly undetectable. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I made certain they heard nothing.”

Of course you did, Hiromasa thought to himself. “I thought they’d been written by a woman.”

“I gave no indication that they were,” said Seimei.

“But _I_ thought they were,” he insisted. “I would never have gotten into the carriage if I hadn’t.”

“But you arrived and discovered that they weren’t, and it did very little to dampen your enthusiasm.” He pinned Hiromasa with his gaze. “Would I have needed a spell to bring you here?”

Hiromasa groaned and dropped his head into his hands. “You could have said something to me afterwards.”

How was it possible for him to smile like that, without actually smiling? “I sent a letter this very morning, as is proper.”

“When I called this afternoon,” Hiromasa ground out. Seimei did have the good grace to look abashed at this.

“That was wrong,” he said, very quietly. “It did not occur to me last evening that you might not remember. And then, thoughtfully, "The effects of the alcohol may have been compounded by the charm.”

“But you said there was no need—“ Hiromasa rose to his knees, Seimei’s apology all but forgotten.

“For a love spell, no. The charm was to aid in another matter.” Seimei’s lips twisted into his fox smile. “You were very willing, but also very drunk.”

It took a heartbeat for his meaning to sink in. Hiromasa choked violently and had to spend several moments doubled over on the floor, red faced and sputtering. Seimei leaned against the wall and laughed and laughed. His eyes as he smiled at Hiromasa were very bright.


End file.
